You have pirates and neutrals - anyone from the new player friendly guys in The Scope to the 'Hey look someone's flying a Stabber lets hot drop it with carriers' Shadow Cartel

Ok, so after some thought and feedback, here's what I've come up with.

I'll be on vacation the week before the CSM Summit, and should have plenty of time to set things up. I'm thinking of 2 town hall type sessions, one during EU prime, and another one later on for people in North America. If there is a serious demand for it, I would consider running a 3rd session for those in the AU TZ, I'm just not interested if it's gonna be one dude that shows up, he's welcome to Eve mail me instead.

Anyone with a vested interest in lowsec is welcome. Topics will be restricted to lowsec/FW concerns as well as parts of Eve that bleed into our space. For example, nullsec sov is not really our concern, while nullsec power projection is.

The meetings will be held on a TBD TS server. I will attempt to get some air time on Eve Radio, but if that falls through, we'll broadcast over twitch. I'm tentatively looking at Tuesday the 9th of September 18:00 GMT for the EU session, and Midnight GMT for the North American session. (this is subject to change obviously based on feedback)

Thoughts?

acceptable. do you like to receive big spergy mails as well?

Thank you for reaching out to the players!

I don't mean to be a naysayer but I really can't stand the "town hall meetings." I think they are a complete waste.

I much prefer to give and hear feedback in a forum thread where ideas can be explored a bit more in depth. I think a series of threads that you would follow/contribute to, where people could talk about issues would be much more informative. Not only that but it resolves the scheduling issues.

Thank you for reaching out to the players!

I don't mean to be a naysayer but I really can't stand the "town hall meetings." I think they are a complete waste.

I much prefer to give and hear feedback in a forum thread where ideas can be explored a bit more in depth. I think a series of threads that you would follow/contribute to, where people could talk about issues would be much more informative. Not only that but it resolves the scheduling issues.

Hey guys,

I find that I'm pretty accessible to the guys in Gal Mil, as often when I'm on or playing, it's pretty easy for folks to pop into whatever TS channel I'm in, or talk to me about stuff during slow times in fleets. I'm feeling like I don't get to spend much time talking with people in the other 3 militias. I hung out with some Amarr dudes a couple months ago, it was great, and I'd like to do that more often.

The summer summit coming up in a few weeks, there will be some discussions about lowsec. I know what's important to me, but I was also elected by you guys, and I'm by no means omnipotent with regards to every issue we face. I'd like to sit down, have a talk with the militias as a whole, and firm up on our priorities.

This can be done in a couple of ways: 1: I can see about getting in touch with each militia, and visit with you guys separately on your own TS/Mumble servers. 2: We can organize a sort of LS/FW Town hall and have people from all 4 militias pop on at once and have a pow wow.

How would you guys rather do this?

I'd be very happy to see more recognition of "the rest of us."

...You're more than welcome to post anything that concerns you about lowsec here as well if this is your preference. I'm certainly reading this thread.....

The Rest of the Plan
There are some other changes to the rest of our original roadmap that we are making after consultation with the community:

...

We will be attempting to release two new features to the FW complexes that have been suggested many times by the FW community to increase PVP opportunities in complexes:

Have plex capture timers count backwards to the default state when no players are contesting them

.

Our position on timer rollbacks has not changed. We'd like to do them at some point, but they will not be coming in Kronos.

I agree that timer rollbacks need to be added.

However,

I think that they will be considered a "catalyst for warzone stagnation" and so they probably want to implement something that enhances warzone movement before or at the same time.


Right now

I think the penalties / bonus's given for Tiers 1, 3, 4 and 5 are too wide.

There should be the means to "contract to Militia". (massive aid for supply/resupply to open Militia fleets, fitted ships in particular)

The most desirable LP store items are not spread equally over the 4 factions.

The spawn rates on NPC's in plex's should be capped (to 5 max) with a longer window for respawn rate.

NPC spawns in FW plex's should aggress all parties other than the defending faction.

The suspect flag for aggression within a FW plex should be removed, for all parties. Warzone, neutral zone, "no mans land". Describe it how you want. It is a poor mechanic for defending your already War Dec'd role and is a PvP suppressant.

As far as farmers go, they will always be there. ...

Farmers under control with latest changes to plex rats. Timer rollbacks not needed at this point in time.

If you are fine with the war being won by alts in empty frigates d-plexing systems and running from every fight, then nothing needs to be done. That's true.

This is patently false. The alts in empty frigs are left unattended so their main can pay attention to other things, and they purposefully get podded to sell the kill rights (nuetrals) as well as for quicker reshipping times.

Defensive plexing alts have not kept us from taking any system we want to take, btw.

The way i see it, d-plexing alts are the emergent alternative to the timer roll backs we wanted. One thing is for sure cearain, d-plexing alts are no opposition to, well, anyone..

Once a system is taken by an offensive campaign, then its your defensive advantage.

The current Gallente push was triggered by a Caldari push for Rakapas. Caldaris attack of Rakapas was not done by alts, nor was our defense, nor was our counter attack on the Kurala constellation, nor was Caldaris defense of it.

You keep repeating the 2 year out of date impressions you have of faction war, even in min/amarr wz im pretty confident that most system captures are being driven by actual pvp'ers. You just live in a parallel dimension where facts are invisible.

Rabbit plexing alts were never opposition to anyone but they have always decided occupancy. CCP has never taken the steps to make faction war occupancy be mostly decided by pvp.

~~But IMO~~

Just because your push for Huola wasnt successful i know you would like to blame farmer alts, but in reality it was a pvp fail on your sides behalf..

The only things deciding occupancy in our warzone are hundreds of dead ships. Only difference is we wont blame farmer alts if we fail.

I'm fully down for this. I welcome you to ping me any time in game and pop on the public CalMil comms and I can chat with you and find others interested in doing so from Caldari. As for a pow wow involving everyone at once, as much as I'd love to have that I feel like it would degrade to name calling at some point. I just don't see certain people on opposing sides getting along for very long on TeamSpeak.

I never blamed alts for our failure to take huola. We could not get enough pvp pilots into huola for a long enough period of time. This null sec junior pvp does exist in fw no doubt. But it really doesn't effect the occupancy warzone as a whole.





Rabbit plexers gain way more vp than pvp mains in faction war. This was true when Caldari won, it was true when gallente won and its true now.


There are 20,000 active characters in faction war. When we attacked huola we were lucky if we had 200 people fighting at one time. There are allot of alts in faction war. I would really like faction war to be something worth putting a main in. I would like to have fights in plexes and not just alts in plexes.

You have pirates and neutrals - anyone from the new player friendly guys in The Scope to the 'Hey look someone's flying a Stabber lets hot drop it with carriers' Shadow Cartel, PL etc.

The main issue I see with faction warfare is it is being farmed by carebears who run full a rack of stabs and warp out if anyone comes into the site. Maybe make a 15k warp disruption field around the actual capture point, As it gets closer to being capture expand out the field. Making people have to be relatively commited to it. The current system the way it is and warp core stabs are part of the reson why alot people "blob" single ships in sites.

I mean why waste time trying to look for stuff solo if all that is going to happen is they are going to warp out anyways? Why not just get 3 or 4 friends together and go look for stuff and all point it before it gets out?

First, I would like to see killmails to this accusation please.
Secondl If you take the time to go here. Considering what you just said, there is no difference between you, SC, PL, BL or any other entity with bigger or stronger ships. Just as PL drops their supercapitals on everything undocked, from a carier to a velotr. Shadow Cartel organizing and forming roams, 2-3 man fleets to go look for site runners or something to shoot at or even gatecamps. You take 6 people to kill a completely defenseless mining ship that couldnt attack back. Throwing around some silly slander like that doesn't help anyone and everyone, EVERYONE is in the same boat when it comes to PVP.

---

The main issue I see with faction warfare is it is being farmed by carebears who run full a rack of stabs and warp out if anyone comes into the site. Maybe make a 15k warp disruption field around the actual capture point, As it gets closer to being capture expand out the field. Making people have to be relatively commited to it. The current system the way it is and warp core stabs are part of the reson why alot people "blob" single ships in sites.

I mean why waste time trying to look for stuff solo if all that is going to happen is they are going to warp out anyways? Why not just get 3 or 4 friends together and go look for stuff and all point it before it gets out?

https://zkillboard.com/kill/40585798/ Props to you for letting someone roam with you in a Harbinger...

I dont want to hijack this thread with an off topic mud slingling fest, if someone wants to fly a 200 Mil ISK Exhumer in low sec then thats them being silly and they will die. My views are my own - I am not a diplo for my alliance.

The difference between Shadow Cartel and PL in the Amarr/Mini warzone is that you are too big for it - you have simply become an environmental hazard, like CODE in highsec. When most of the other factions in your area of low sec have to make the choice of "Well do we undock anything bigger than a dessie fleet and risk a drop by bored super pirates?" then thats a warning sign you are depriving yourself of content. I have been in fleets where we are sitting blasting it out in T1 cruisers or HACs, battleships etc against a similar sized fleet and the clear undertanding in fleet is that we are on an invisible timer with the engagement before you guys or PL notice and crash it. Or where a large engagement on a gate is seeing the enemy losing but they are not deagressing and keeping on field - e-honour? No, here comes the batphoned PL/SC cyno alt into local and the order to de-agress is swiftly given.

If you form a cruiser roam I would be surprised if anyone chooses to engage you toe to toe in any numbers - because they realise if they start winning the most likely response will be an upshipping/cyno drop all the way up to capitals which no one else is going to put on the line. This is why corps who like low sec sub cap fleet pvp drop out of alliances like yours - potential enemies see the Shadow Cartel/PL/BL tag and think no way - instant lose why bother?

I apologise for the exageration about the Stabber vs Carriers but the point I highlighted remains the same.

Alternatively, instead of this cloak nerf, which did nothing whatsoever to fix the farming problem (and in fact made it worse), you could fix it just as easily by disabling entry to the plex if you have warp stabs equipped to your ship. This would likely also be much less load on the server side as it's no longer having to project out a warp scramming effect in a radius like a bubble and instead simply deny entry.

Disabling cloaks within 30km of the beacon was the opposite move in my opinion that CCP should have done to fix farming. One of the best ways to catch them was cloaky ships, like a Nemesis with multiple scrams. That is no longer possible. Additionally, you can't use things like a Pilgrim in a plex anymore, at least not as effectively. Now you have to be way off the beacon in order to use anything cloaky.

While the cloak nerf doesn't really hinder the usage of things like Falcons, Rapiers or Huginns, it does drastically diminish the usability of Pilgrims, Stratios and Asteros inside combat plexes. In essence, by disabling cloaks inside the plex, all they managed to actually accomplish was limit legitimate combat tactics from being used and make it safer to farm.

... Alternatively, instead of this cloak nerf, which did nothing whatsoever to fix the farming problem (and in fact made it worse), you could fix it just as easily by disabling entry to the plex if you have warp stabs equipped to your ship. This would likely also be much less load on the server side as it's no longer having to project out a warp scramming effect in a radius like a bubble and instead simply deny entry...

... limiting how people fit their ships and choose to play the game is a mistake in my opinion.

I also think all of the talk of sec status hits or making plexes sec status free zones is a bad idea. I understand not wanting to lose sec status. It's a b**ch to get back up. So you have a choice, shoot first and take the hit, or wait to aggress and maybe lose the fight. HTFU and live with the consequences.

The main issue I see with faction warfare is it is being farmed by carebears who run full a rack of stabs and warp out if anyone comes into the site.

The problem you have is that you believe what you see with your own eyes, instead of what certain gallente pilots say. Start drinking more Kool-aid and you will see alts effect nothing and the occupancy war is all about pvpers.


Why are certain Gallente arguing against the obvious and huge impact of alts d-plexing? They are down to 5 systems and want to "win" fw again. The last thing they want in their subsequent circle jerk thread is anyone to claim these mechanics favor rabbit plexing. And they definitely don't want ccp to change the mechanics so that when their defensive plexing alts run from the plex the timer rollsback.

Well, what I see is an almost risk-free environment. You don't even have to d-scan. Just wait for something to warp in then start to warp off. Unless they are packing 2-3 scrams, your chances of getting out are 100% because the vexor has 4-5 stabs. This is common.
If the gallente want space back they should try that offensive thing sometime. Running from a point the second an atron comes really isn't going to gain them anything. ...

If you think not having lots of plexes run in stabbed alts is stagnation then yes timer rollbacks will bring stagnation. But in terms of people really caring about tiers and warzone control as a whole (other than the occasional home system attack for lulz) it's already stagnant. Taht ship sailed on October 22 2012.

If you are afraid there will be little plexing due to plex timer rollbacks then ccp should just dramatically slash the lp pay from level 4 fw missions. Problem solved. LP will increase in value and go to people who are willing to risk it in pvp related plexing.

As for the rest in the above quote it is pretty much the sort of changes that really wont effect anything. I'm not saying they are bad ideas. The last idea is really pretty good but its not going to change much. FW whill still be factionwhorefare.

Farmers under control with latest changes to plex rats. Timer rollbacks not needed at this point in time.

Otherwise, FW has generated more content for more entities than any other part of the game this summer.

If anything, CCP should investigate ways to make NPC 0.0 and/or non-FW low sec systems more attractive.

This is patently false. The alts in empty frigs are left unattended so their main can pay attention to other things, and they purposefully get podded to sell the kill rights (nuetrals) as well as for quicker reshipping times.

Defensive plexing alts have not kept us from taking any system we want to take, btw.

You keep repeating the 2 year out of date impressions you have of faction war, even in min/amarr wz im pretty confident that most system captures are being driven by actual pvp'ers. You just live in a parallel dimension where facts are invisible.

Any post that includes this from you is bound to be worthless.

I don't like this idea, because:



I agree that it is annoying that people who are in a plex aren't always waiting for a fight and some of them just want to plex. However, as someone who has at times just wanted to plex, you can't force me to fight you if I am paying attention and don't want to fight you. Just like just about every other situation in EVE. People wont take the fight if they don't think they can win and there is no point getting mad at people who have different objectives than you do.

stabbed drone boats.

Good Response to Stuff

I do not think the current crop of evasion offensive plexers from the Gallente Militia in the systems around Tzvi, Sifilar, Raa and Oyeman support your assumptions.

You just left them little room to work in your own Warzone.

Why are certain Gallente arguing against the obvious and huge impact of alts d-plexing? They are down to 5 systems and want to "win" fw again.

The difference now is that the timescale for system flips by the "evasion alts" is much slower and puts much less stress on players who actually live in the war zone. Timer rollbacks would have the same effect, but wouldn't "solve" the problem. You might be able to argue that timer rollbacks would be worse since
1. the dps check is always applied even if the defender is not logged in, and
2. The timer doesn't run until the rat is destroyed. The "evasion plexer" can't kill a rat quickly enough before an active defender runs him out. Timer doesn't count down.

So anyways, that's the argument for no longer needing a timer rollback feature. Take it for what it's worth.

Now ask yourself if timer rollbacks would "solve" the issue of afk defensive plexing alts? Answer: Not really. The only way to "stop" a defensive plexing alt is to attack the system.

Hmm not sure I understand your logic, there.

1. Rabbit plexer has run a medium for 18 minutes
2. Shooter plexer chases him out
3. Rabbit plexer starts to run a novice
4. After 5 minutes, shooter plexer warps to novice and chases him out
5. Since they have nothing better to do with their playtime, Rabbit and Shooter proceed to chase eachother between the 2 plexes

Result: no plex is captured, the Shooter has succesfully defended the system.

Hmm not sure I understand your logic, there.

1. Rabbit plexer has run a medium for 18 minutes
2. Shooter plexer chases him out
3. Rabbit plexer starts to run a novice
4. After 5 minutes, shooter plexer warps to novice and chases him out
5. Since they have nothing better to do with their playtime, Rabbit and Shooter proceed to chase eachother between the 2 plexes

Result: no plex is captured, the Shooter has succesfully defended the system.

Sure bouncing back should be hard, but it shouldnt need a washed up 2000 ....

No the rabbit d-plexer will have made ground. Because he can run all the plexes in a frigate and never needs to spend time reshipping. The pvper has to go x number of jumps to get in a ship that can go in each plex and or shoot the rats. The d-plexer realistically just has to just go a few jumps over and run plexes there. Between the gate restrictions and the rat tanks the pvpers will likely not be able to run down his timer even if he wanted to.

This is a reason why systems are not as highly contested as they were. This was a huge boon to rabbit d-plexing alts.

If there were rollbacks then the rabbit d-plexing alts would have a harder time effecting occupancy.

The deplexer only has power in systems with relatively high contested rates and no pvp activity. A rare combination at the moment. They are having a very similar effect to timer roll backs.

The main benefit over rollbacks, as XG pointed out, rollbacks would do nothing to discourage O-farmers unless working in conjunction with people chasing these farmers around all over the warzone. Design that relies on people chasing farmers is bad design. Therefor in retrospect the current design is more desirable than rollbacks.

Farmers being used to only defend is a better state of affairs than farmers being used to attack.

I am not sure I understand what you are saying here.

Rollbacks would effect all rabbit plexers equally. Oplexers that leave a plex would start losing time they put into a plex just like defensive plexers would. Everyone would have an incentive to stay and fight instead of just running and hiding.

Maybe because your side is currently in control of over 96% of the warzone you think rabbit d-plexers are better than rabbit o-plexers. But really both forms of rabbits have far too much influence on occupancy. Timer rollbacks will decrease the importance of those who want to always run and will make people who are inclined to stay and fight relatively more valuable. That is exactly what fw needs.

Actual result :
1. No interactive game play takes place (you don't really consider warping around after a d-scan entry interactive right?).
2. One player does not have motive for interactive play (most likely this is a side show to generate isk at lowest amount of effort)
3. Other player is looking for interactive play. Tries hard to find it but often leaves disappointed.
4. Other player chooses to log in less and less, choosing an alternative more interactive pastime.

I would be more inclined to agree with your reasoning if the rabbit and the fox were both playing the game with the same end results in mind. As the rabbit, if I can't plex and get my tasty LP, then I at least prevent/slow your deplexing ability by forcing you to chase me. I might harvest some tears to fuel my soul as well. If you get frustrated and give up, I win our psychological pvp battle and you go on the forums and complain how my play style ruins the game. Those are also tasty tears. You might have not enjoyed our interaction, but we did interact. - Point 1 covered

I, as a proud member of Gallente Militia, want to do what I can to help the militia, so I pony up my hard earned cash and pay for an account to create a deplexing alt. While I go about my dirty pew pew lifestyle, my gentle alt helps to further the Gallente agenda of total domination of the warzone by deplexing systems. While he/she might not be engaging in a play style you consider interactive, he/she is doing her part for the Federation. If the system she is deplexing is important to you, chase her out. There we are at the different end game goal from point 1: interaction but not the interaction you want. - Point 2 covered

Point 3 - See above mentioned tears reference. As a side note, having a deplexing alt attacked or killed has led to pew as I now know where there is prey. After you chase or kill the next deplexing alt, if I show up, you know who my alt is and you now know how to get a fight.

Point 4 - Can I have your stuff?

Given what they want fw to be their aversion to plex timer rollbacks makes perfect sense. As Theroine said, people who want fights instead of chasing rabbits are after different ends than he is. Plex timer rollbacks is one proposal that clearly separates the 2 camps.

What proposals we like will depend on what sort of game we want to play.

Given the posts from XG, Crosi and the one I quote above it is clear that certain gallente (although I am sure not all) actually like the fact that fw occupancy is largely about having alts rabbit d-plex.

Given what they want fw to be their aversion to plex timer rollbacks makes perfect sense. As Theroine said, people who want fights instead of chasing rabbits are after different ends than he is.

Plex timer rollbacks is one proposal that clearly separates the 2 camps.

I don't understand these objections. not really needed 'right now'? what about not right now?

not effective for warzone control. what about effective for padding your wallet?

I will say that defensive plexing is not very good at padding your wallet because you only get a fraction of the lp. That is really why I would agree that that the d-plexers are not really "farmers." They are not in it for the isk they are doing this for the warzone control.

I think the timer roll backs would be a bad idea because it would make any time you had to leave a plex unattended suck. And I already feel like oplexing sucks now, if I wanted to kill waves of useless rats that do literally nothing for me but waste my ammo I'd run l1 missions in high sec. What if neutrals show up and push you out? They aren't a part of the FW mechanics but now they are preventingmy ability to contest the system, and are in fact defending it by virtue of keeping in me out of the plex I was in. What if I go help a buddy in another plex, on a gate, dock up for reps or literally anything that takes me away from the capture point? Realistically if you want the timer to roll back you should have a pilot there to run it down. It doesn't matter what you think the motivation of the pilot your dscan tells you is in a plex is. All that matter is what your goal is and how you achieve it. You want a warzone where control is determined by occupying a system? Then undock and occupy that system. If you're not willing to chase away or hunt down any fool who tries to plex a system you claim as yours then you will lose that system (Or you do that and the entire Gallente militia come along anyway to push you out anyway :P). These "rabbits" as you call them don't determine warzone control. At best they slow one side down a little bit and offer the other side a little more buffer time to figure out what is going on.

And seriously, plex rats need to lose that magic MWD that makes them skate across the plex faster than anything else on grid. I'd also like to repeat that attacking fellow milita pilots should flag you as a suspect, as shoudl warping into a FW plex if you're a neutral. I also feel like the oplex rat spawns need some tweaking, but if their speed is adjusted that might make killing them more bearable

My deplexing alt is at 1.3 million LP over the past two weeks because we're at Tier 4 and it goes to highly contested, unpopulated systems. So, yeah, it's great for padding the wallet.

Key isn't plexing mechanics, it's rewards at higher Tier levels. Farmers/rabbits come out when the rewards are high. Tier rewards also provide incentive for players to push the warzone. Pushing the warzone has proven to be the best conflict driver in the game this summer. So it's a Yin/Yang issue.

But anyway IMO ideally plexing would be a pvp mechanic and fw missions would remain a pve mechanic.

Using a tounge-in-cheek forum reply to shore up your argument is dubious at best. The main point I was trying to convey is that we should not be making sweeping generalizations on what interaction, play style, goals, etc. are. Considering that this thread is supposed to be geared to ideas on the low sec fw meeting, I should have gone for a more useful reply than a humorous one. I think that goes for all our replies.

I am on the fence when it comes to timer rollbacks. I think that the strengthened plex rat and increased spawn have done a lot to greatly reduce the offensive farming of plexes by afk alts. And, if you are serious in your stance on fw occupancy being largely decided by deplexing alts, I really don't see how you come to that conclusion. Does it give the defender an advantage? Yes, but how do you change the mechanic, other than rollbacks, to address the situation? If you implement rollbacks, how do you address your rabbit deplexing problem without the fix adding to the problem of limiting play styles.

Plexing is a PVP mechanic, or haven't you seen the killboards lately?
Top corporations on Zkillboard RIGHT NOW.
Brave Newbies Inc. 2,210 - Huge corporation
Justified Chaos 1,713 FACTION WARFARE
C.Q.B 1,630 FACTION WARFARE
Red Federation 1,586 - Huge corporation
Black Fox Marauders 1,582 FACTION WARFARE
Blue Republic 1,462 - Huge corporation
GoonWaffe 1,358 - Huge corporation
EVE Corporation 987654321-POP 1,189 - High Sec Gankers
The Great Harmon Institute ... 1,062 FACTION WARFARE
Love Squad 1,017 - Reasonably sized corporation

Most of the kills in FW are due to Gallente attacking home systems and Caldari defending.

Is it a 100% of the time pvp Mechanic? No it is not. The nature of this game is that both sides need to decide to fight and if one backs out then it's PvE.

This "PvE plexing mechanic" is generating more pvp than any other mechanic in this game right now.

How many plexes did your alt capture in the last 2 weeks?

1 million LP worth, so probably about 100. 8ish per day.

Do you concede that the plexing has provided more pvp than any other mechanic in the game this summer?

I have always been a huge fan of plex pvp.

A simple "yes" would have done.

CCP must have done something terribly wrong when they created a PvE mechanic that got this much PvP.

We need a total FW reset - not elegant speeches about rules.

Timer rollbacks would be okay if there was a delay before the rollback started. It would take 5 mins for the timer on a novice to start to roll back, 10 for a small, 15 for a medium, etc.

Fix Null. Everything else will fall into place. Nullbears farming FW? Bored ganker explosion in high? It's all related to the stagnation rotting Null.

Amarr militia ceased to be an effective fighting force after Huola. It needs new faces more then anything else.

There are definitely still some mechanisms that could be improved that would trigger repopulation but, the need is for amendments that are inclusive of various game styles not oppressive to them.

if you see plexing as pve you can also see reinforcements timers as pve.

It is a mechanic to force people to be in space at certain timespans and certain locations. Thats purely pvp to me. The fact that waiting in space in a plex rewards LP and waiting for a timer on a poco does not is only a side effect. It is the same mechanic.

FW missions are pve. Plexing is a conflict driver. Its king of the hill, other games have that too.

Fix Null. Everything else will fall into place. Nullbears farming FW? Bored ganker explosion in high? It's all related to the stagnation rotting Null.

Amarr militia ceased to be an effective fighting force after Huola. It needs new faces more then anything else.

It seems to me making FW a game that is best played with your main (as opposed to with alts) ...

Corp/Alliance rework will be handy, especially when it comes to contracts, hangars, roles, titles, and taxation.

To respond to a couple others:

We used to complain about plexing alts, so we made some to counter them.
We used to complain about off grid link alts, so we made some to counter them.
etc.

It already is.

I feel Awoxing is a common enough problem that it needs to be punished more aggressively. Suspect timers and larger standings hits for friendly fire are a start, adjusting how a player corp standings are calculated toward their militia to not give active Awoxers a week to grind standings would be a good idea too, and remove the standing hit if the target you kill in your militia has a suspect flag.
I think that corporations should gain LP or something from the work their pilots do for militia, something along the lines of an LP tax maybe.

Oh yeah...smartbombs. Can we make it so that standings hit for hitting fleet members is non existent? (Players will be able to choose who they fleet with, if people are awoxers simply don't invite them to fleet) Smartbombing drones in a fight or for pods is really fun, but I lose a good amount of standing for hitting allied drones or nicking someones ship. I lost a good 1.0-1.5 caldari state standing in abune alone.

all the way down to -5 from +9.

You realize Defensive Plexing already has a HUGE penalty right? If you run an offensive plex in Caldari worth 10k right now, you get a 5k payout. Gallente are T4 and if their system is 20% contested they would get 3500 to deplex it.

You realize Defensive Plexing already has a HUGE penalty right? If you run an offensive plex in Caldari worth 10k right now, you get a 5k payout. Gallente are T4 and if their system is 20% contested they would get 3500 to deplex it.

It's still too high for a 1hr old alt that can complete the plex in a 20k ISK ship (Navitas) with a free clone.

I'd support a decrease on rewards for d-plexing when at high tiers like that. Say d-plexing stays at T2 rewards no matter how high you go?


Also, I really really REALLY love how people assume deplexing and oplexing alts didn't exist before the recent expansion. Were they just so ingrained before that people didn't realize how much back and forth plexing we had to do just to keep systems stable?

I will just say that there are alltot of posts about balance issues and lp. CCP has been messing with lp up and down and changing tiers but it doesn't effect the real problem. FW occupancy still ends up a game for rabbit plexing alts this is root of the problem and until it is dealt with fw occupancy will fail to be fun.




The problem is not how much lp defensive players get. The problem is that rabbit plexing works at all. CCP needs to take steps to eradicate rabbit plexing. Offensive and defensive rabbit plexing needs to go. The goal should be that each plex captured involves at least 1.5 pvp fights.

You are absolutely correct that this is not just a problem since the last expansion. It has been a problem since the start of faction war. And for the first few years of faction war we got no lp for plexing at all. The problem was the game was boring because you could capture a hundred plexes without a fight.

How can ccp make it so each plex captured involves 1.5 fights on average?

1) Timer rollbacks
2) an intel system where everyone in militia know where and when plex timers are being run. That way they can quickly and easily get there and defend it.

Those 2 steps would eliminate rabbit plexing and make occupancy a pvp game. CCP has said they would take these steps but never have. Once that is done, then and only then, start thinking about how the rewards should be tweaked. Because if you are losing a ship every other plex you take you may actually need that lp! If that happens then fw missions will also need their lp cut.

But trying to balance the rewards for plexing before the actual plex mechanics are worked out is not smart. It has been the focus error ccp has made throughout. They never focused on ending rabbit plexing and they simply hoped throwing isk at it would make everyone happy. As for me, I plexed when we had lp and when we didn't and it doesn't matter. If occupancy remains a game of rabbit plexing it sucks.

1) No argument, though the need for them is far less with the drastic oplexing nerf.

2) Already implemented, its called the FW window.

Thanks

I'm glad to see you are no longer trying to argue against timer rollbacks, but I see you are still in favor of the game being won by rabbit d-plexxers. Your favorable view toward rabbit d-plexing makes your constant arguments against these two measures understandable.

Ive been advocating timer rollbacks for longer than you have. Unlike you, i know what problem they were intended to fix. That problem has been resolved in an alternative way.

As i have said before, d-plex alts ensure all occupancy is a pvp effort. Depending on which system is being attacked dictates how blobby the response is. For example, mantenault hs changed hands quite frequently in recent months under the constant pressure of a small gang of russian squids (who do fight, before you make another uninformed assumption) living out of a pos. These same russians would have no effect if they tried the same thing in say, nenna.

Ill now let you get back to posting complete nonsense, thanks.

d-plex alts are occupancy efforts. They change the contested level in a system. They are not pvp.

You think my views are nonesense because you explicitly like alt rabbit d-plexing. The 2 proposals I support would eliminate them.

It's really just up to ccp whether they want occupancy to be held through deplexing rabbit alts, or pvp.

Timer rollbacks will not kill d-plexing alts. Intel on where alts are dplexing will not kill alts.

Only these mythical pilots who are interested in chasing non combat alts in systems they dont care about, kill dplexing alts. Something that they can do right now.

The way to nullify dplexing alts in a system or area, is for pilots to actively start caring about that system or area and focus pilots there. Once that happens dplexing alts are useless and a pvp response is triggered. Size of the response would normally be dependant on the location of the system and its strategic value. The winner would likely be the side who cares about it more, al things being equal.

Timer rollbacks will not kill d-plexing alts. Intel on where alts are dplexing will not kill alts.

Only these mythical pilots who are interested in chasing non combat alts in systems they dont care about, kill dplexing alts. Something that they can do right now..

The way to nullify dplexing alts in a system or area, is for pilots to actively start caring about that system or area and focus pilots there. Once that happens dplexing alts are useless and a pvp response is triggered. Size of the response would normally be dependant on the location of the system and its strategic value. The winner would likely be the side who cares about it more, al things being equal.

I will just say that there are alltot of posts about balance issues and lp. CCP has been messing with lp up and down and changing tiers but it doesn't effect the real problem. FW occupancy still ends up a game for rabbit plexing alts this is root of the problem and until it is dealt with fw occupancy will fail to be fun.




The problem is not how much lp defensive players get. The problem is that rabbit plexing works at all. CCP needs to take steps to eradicate rabbit plexing. Offensive and defensive rabbit plexing needs to go. The goal should be that each plex captured involves at least 1.5 pvp fights.

You are absolutely correct that this is not just a problem since the last expansion. It has been a problem since the start of faction war. And for the first few years of faction war we got no lp for plexing at all. The problem was the game was boring because you could capture a hundred plexes without a fight.

How can ccp make it so each plex captured involves 1.5 fights on average?

1) Timer rollbacks
2) an intel system where everyone in militia know where and when plex timers are being run. That way they can quickly and easily get there and defend it.

Those 2 steps would eliminate rabbit plexing and make occupancy a pvp game. CCP has said they would take these steps but never have. Once that is done, then and only then, start thinking about how the rewards should be tweaked. Because if you are losing a ship every other plex you take you may actually need that lp! If that happens then fw missions will also need their lp cut.

But trying to balance the rewards for plexing before the actual plex mechanics are worked out is not smart. It has been the focus error ccp has made throughout. They never focused on ending rabbit plexing and they simply hoped throwing isk at it would make everyone happy. As for me, I plexed when we had lp and when we didn't and it doesn't matter. If occupancy remains a game of rabbit plexing it sucks.

Dude, what?

I don't think someone can build a game mechanics that would force 1.5 PVP fights. Partially because half a fight would be hard to do, and you can't force a fight anyway.

If someone sees you coming and doesn't want to fight you they wont. Deal with it.

A timer rollback, or at least and instant timer rollback would be a terrible idea because it would allow non-FW pilots to impact the contested level of a system significantly, and would make plexing in general suck even more than it does now. .

If there was a scaling delay before a roll back started that might be better. But ultimately if you want to roll back the timer in a plex there is a very easy way to do it - sit in that plex just like everyone else. Maybe the guy who ran from you is coming back with friends? [lol yeah but there is also that chance that they are just alts rabbit plexing and what do you think happens 99% of the time?]

All in all your arguments don't seem fleshed out, and like I've mentioned earlier seem to be based solely from the experience of trying to nab dudes farming in backwater systems by yourself.....

Meaningless drivel

Meaningful and intelligent input

Stuff.

For example

1. militia pilot arrives in system, having noticed the contested rate was rising
2. finds the aforementioned evasion plexer running a plex and already minutes in to capturing
3. Pursues target out of the plex
4. Target opens another plex of equal or smaller size in either the same system or neighbouring system
5. Militia pilot can chase target out of the newly opened 2nd plex or can run down and capture the original
6. In both options the target "evasion alt" can capture either the new plex or the original plex by moving back and forth between them.
7. Only option to the hunter is to give up on defending war zone sov by combat and instead join in the non interactive farming of victory points in the opposite direction or call in further pilots to sit in all the plex's available
8. Evasion plexer's will continue with non interactive play as they know that eventually they will be given time to plex without a pursuer or will find the opposing players give up due to boredom from unsatisfying non interaction play, instead moving on hoping to find another target that will consider interaction.


Timer rollbacks at an accelerated rate (when moving towards the "neutral" uncontested plex state) prevent the scenario described above and would further decentivise this bad game style at the benefit of more interactive play. The FWzones need this.

It is one of the reasons why there are more fights between active Militia vs neutrals / pirates than there is between Militia vs Militia

Personally I would have to implement the reduction of the bonus's to LP rewards given by faction Tier levels at the same time. They are currently ridiculous...

still not seeing any reason not to do it

As someone has already said, the biggest pure negative is neutrals griefing militia folk. Oddly, depending on your viewpoint this would be the only remaining reason to do it, right TD?

Sorry TD but if you want to influence occupancy, better join up. No pros without cons sorry.

nice bait there. I don't want to influence occupancy, I want to influence isk making.

Then hunt mission runners, not plexers. Mission runners absolutely crush plexers when it comes to lp/hr.

I would but they're immune to pvp unless you go to insane lengths to hunt them specifically, which is bullshit.

trashing fw missions should be the main thing talked about at this meeting or whatever this thread was originally about.

No harder than hunting DED site runners if you are hunting Gal Mil mission runners anyways.

The speed factor is offset a bit by the fact that they pop up in your overview imo.

yes, that's obviously an important consideration in their design, but they're total failure and should be redone.

Having dodged TD (and many of his pirate friends) many times in my cloaky/MWD Mishtar, I can attest that a) missions are too fast/easy and b) you can avoid pvp if you so choose. And I wasn't even using I go wherever I want risk free .... errrr.... cov ops T3.

EDIT: Not farming tears here. I legitimately think isk making in FW needs to be discussed at any town hall.

As someone has already said, the biggest pure negative is neutrals griefing militia folk. Oddly, depending on your viewpoint this would be the only remaining reason to do it, right TD?

Sorry TD but if you want to influence occupancy, better join up. No pros without cons sorry.

By griefing do you mean wanting to pvp in the plex? Oh no! Poor faction war players might have to live with low sec pvpers! FW players are getting more and more pathetic because the mechanics attract more and more carebears.

Bottom line: all Crosi's problems will be solved if faction war moved to high sec.

there's also no consequence to running away. you have what, a day to do the mission?

Pretty much, love me a bit of high sec. Thats exactly what i was saying. Or at least what you thought i was saying. Which is about as accurate as anything else you have ever thought.

Well concord would protect your alt plexers from those neutral pvp "griefers." So it solves that problem, doesn't it?

You were crying about other neutral low sec pvpers in your other post as well. High sec is what you are asking for.

nice bait there. I don't want to influence occupancy, I want to influence isk making.

Another example of your inability to understand any simple concept. I wasnt complaining about neutral entities. I was blaming them for the lack of larger ship hull pvp, rather than what you blame for absolutely everything, 'rabbit farmers' lol.

Well large ships can't even get in novice, small, or medium plexes so would you agree there is no drawback to having rollbacks in those?

My deplexing alt is at 1.3 million LP over the past two weeks because we're at Tier 4 and it goes to highly contested, unpopulated systems. So, yeah, it's great for padding the wallet.

Key isn't plexing mechanics, it's rewards at higher Tier levels. Farmers/rabbits come out when the rewards are high. Tier rewards also provide incentive for players to push the warzone. Pushing the warzone has proven to be the best conflict driver in the game this summer. So it's a Yin/Yang issue.

In the past most fights were never taken in plexes at all. My post very clearly stated that the reason these larger hulls were not used had nothing to do with any FW mechanics. Are you really so desperate to be contrarian that you cant even read?

If you are going to concern troll then at least try to be good at it rather than a sperg lord.

Now, in your own mind im sure you are maintaining a coherent and consistent argument. But are you at all aware that everyone else thinks you are mental?

If i was mad i would claim that i wasnt

I agree that timer rollbacks need to be added.

However,

I think that they will be considered a "catalyst for warzone stagnation" and so they probably want to implement something that enhances warzone movement before or at the same time.


Right now

I think the penalties / bonus's given for Tiers 1, 3, 4 and 5 are too wide.

There should be the means to "contract to Militia". (massive aid for supply/resupply to open Militia fleets, fitted ships in particular)

The most desirable LP store items are not spread equally over the 4 factions.

The spawn rates on NPC's in plex's should be capped (to 5 max) with a longer window for respawn rate.

NPC spawns in FW plex's should aggress all parties other than the defending faction.

The suspect flag for aggression within a FW plex should be removed, for all parties. Warzone, neutral zone, "no mans land". Describe it how you want. It is a poor mechanic for defending your already War Dec'd role and is a PvP suppressant.


Then when there is time...

Ranks should be reworked so they can be achieved by either LP accumulated or FW kill scores.

Rewards PvP kills in a different way to LP for all participants on the km - could be tied in with both the Rank system, the LP store, the system level bonus system and more.

LP store should be cleaned up and rebalanced so that modules are a more common and worthwhile choice.

Faction Tech II ammo in LP stores (charges were done, now do other consumables). Give the crystals high burn out rates and make the Faction Tech II ammo for other types larger (less per reload).

Set the system level upgrades as destroyable modules built onto the ihub (same as null-sec station services). Levels are then downgraded by combat at the I-hub or by system flip only.

Introduce a rare faction ship reward, obtainable from the LP store only with the medal for full Warzone control and whilst holding the highest rank.

Introduce a new highest level rank that is obtainable only by FW kills not LP accumulation. Elite rank should be an extremely accomplished combat position.


Mmm... so a few to start with.

reduce the average amount of LP gained by pretty much any activity thus increasing the relative value.

but that doesn't change the fact that if overall LP rewards are reduced it is worth more

There are lots of changes that could be done, many have been suggest last year when it was a hot topic on several occassions. One of the things I still can't understand though is why they still give FW so much damn LP.

I mean why does Tier 4 have to give 450% more LP then T1??????????? Who needs 1-2mil LP a day to fund PVP?????????

Back before Retribution I suggested the following (IIRC)

T1 = -5%
T2 = Base
T3 = +5%
T4= +10%
T5= +15%

Same applied to missions, I mean why do L4 missions at T4 need to give something like 85K LP?????????

It's totally insane. Have more subtle bonuses would at least help create a little bit of Faction loyalty and less motive for PVE gangs to keep changing side, because as it stands now losing factions start to bleed players rapidly as pilots go where the LP is, not great for creating a good PVP machine, it makes recruitment very hard and all of this detracts from the purpose of FW, which CCP says is PVP.

I too would like to see some action taken on 'Plexville Eve Edition'. The more we PVP should not mean the faster we lose the war!

you make it sound like null alt farmers are bad, while militia mains having farming alts in fw is not bad.

So before this thread is locked away in the depths of the **** posting vaults. I'd like to reiterate that no FW standings hit for attacking fleet members (concord, sec hits, etc still apply) should be a thing.

Back on topic: Militia level contracts will solve every problem with FW! (ok, not every problem, but most of them for me personally :) )

The age old way of showing that a game mechanic is broken, is to abuse it. I say if Gallente can easily hold total warzone control for over a certain time period (maybe a month?), then CCP will have to concede that the current system is broken.

If you really want to exacerbate the fact, we could take warzone control from Amarr and hold that as well.

Another reason for us to let the Caldari back in.

Oh my dear sweet Gallente Jesus yes! That would solve so, so many logistical issues for us and make coordinating reships a WHOLE lot faster.

Yes -because that's what we need atm - Easier life for the Galls

This (also add people in your alliance).

In addition I think you should get a standings bump any time you are promoted (I believe currently it is just the first time you achieve a rank. Please correct me if I am wrong).

Back on topic: Militia level contracts will solve every problem with FW! (ok, not every problem, but most of them for me personally :) )

good stuff

Vary plex difficulty up a bit. Make it affected by the upgrade level of the system as well as the overall militia tier level. The more systems the NPC militia navy has to cover the more spread out they are... Just some thoughts.

acceptable. do you like to receive big spergy mails as well?